Morton M. Leifman z”l
Rabbi Morton M. Leifman was the former vice president of JTS and longtime dean of the former Cantors Institute (now the H. L. Miller Cantorial School). He was an esteemed scholar of Jewish liturgy whose immeasurable service to JTS spanned decades.
A Minneapolis native, Leifman began his five-decade career at JTS in 1959, becoming dean of students of the Teachers Institute and director of the Joint Bet Din. He became the dean of the Cantors Institute-Seminary College of Jewish Music in 1973, and while serving as dean was named senior vice president under Chancellor Gerson Cohen. In the 1980s he was named a vice chancellor at JTS, the title he held at the time of his retirement. He taught nusach and liturgy in both the cantorial and rabbinical schools at JTS.
